Share This Story!

Rule makes it easy to see if recalled car is fixed yet

Government rule will require car companies to let people search for recalled vehicles that haven'tyet been fixed, a boon to used-car buyers and a way to get ore owners to take their recalled cars in for repairs

Rule makes it easy to see if recalled car is fixed yet

A boon to used-car buyers and a way to get more owners to fix recalled cars

A used-car shopper would be able to find out if this specific 2009 Rav4 had had all applicable recall repairs under a new federal rule requiring a recall database searchable by the vehicle identification number.(Photo: Toyota)

Story Highlights

Federal rule will make it easier to search for recalled cars not yet fixed

Government auto safety officials plan to announce a rule today that could improve car-shopping research, and boost the effectiveness of safety recalls.

The final rule, to be announced by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, requires automakers' public websites to allow searches for active recalls using a car's or truck's vehicle identification number (VIN). The information must be updated at least weekly.

Sounds sensible, and indeed some car companies already do it, but it's the first industry-wide regulation standardizing and simplifying the searches. It also applies to motorcycle manufacturers.

Makers have one year from today to install the feature, and they appear eager to do it.

"The goal here is to increase recall completion rates through greater consumer awareness. Providing safety recall information on the websites of automakers" is effective and uses databases car companies already maintain, says the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, the main trade group representing major car companies.

NHTSA says more than 70% of recalled vehicles get fixed. But that leaves a significant number that don't because the owners don't bother, don't know about the recalls, or the vehicles were junked.

Automakers won't have to list recalled vehicles that have been brought in for the repairs, just those that haven't. If a vehicle isn't listed in a VIN search, it either hasn't been recalled, or was recalled and fixed.

"This is an important development. It should make it easier for people buying used cars to know if the vehicle they're about to purchase was part of an uncompleted recall," says Carroll Lachnit, an editor at auto research and shopping site Edmunds.com.

"It's a great thing. The Center for Auto Safety is very happy," says Clarence Ditlow, chief of the advocacy organization -- which he says has been pressing for just such a recall-search feature for 20 years.

The center's website has a recall section that links to the car-company sites that already provide recall searches.

Other provisions of the NHTSA rule:

•Car companies must use the official Department of Transportation logo on recall letters they send to owners. That's to make the seriousness immediately clear to car owners, NHTSA says, "by distinguishing the notices from routine correspondence."

It also should eliminate any temptation to downplay a recall as a simple service issue, which automakers sometimes have done.

•Automakers must tell NHTSA exactly what propulsion system and crash avoidance technologies the vehicles have. NHTSA says that will help "spot defect trends related to those systems and technologies."